Orion's Price (Loralynn Kennakris Book 6)

by Owen R. O’Neill

  Going home. Home to what?

  In the whole time since Captain Malinen had visited her in her cell, no one had breathed another word about Mariwen. While they’d all waited for this day to arrive, she’d clung to the supposition that the success of their scheme meant Mariwen was still alive. But that wasn’t true: the scheme that led to their being exchanged in no way depended on Mariwen surviving—it depended on General Heydrich dying. And he was dead. But what might have happened to Mariwen before he got that way . . .

  Somehow, in a sickening paradox, the act of Artemisia’s main hatch closing behind her, ensuring her freedom, also cut the cords that kept her belief in Mariwen being alive intact. The inexorable logic of the events crashed in on her, leaving her here, sitting on a bunk she didn’t deserve, staring into her open useless hands, feeling numb.

  “What shall I do with this, ma’am?” the marine corporal asked.

  Kris lifted her head and saw the cloth bag in the young man’s hand. She’d brought nothing aboard with her from her captivity, having nothing to bring, and she didn’t recognize the bag. “What is it?”

  “Can’t say, ma’am. A young lady with the legation delivered it, and the commodore said I was to give it to you.”

  “A young lady? On this ship?”

  “Dunno, ma’am. She’s traveling as a guest, so I understand it. But as to what ship, I wasn’t told.”

  She held out her hand and the corporal placed the bag in it. As soon as it touched her palm, she knew the familiar shape and her heart gave a painful lurch—Mariwen’s raven netsuke. Untying the strings with fingers that were suddenly as numb as she felt inside, she spilled the necklace into her hand. The bag crackled and reaching in, she fished out a folded paper note with two fingers. Unfolding it clumsily with one hand while the other closed about the ancient ivory, she read:

  Kris,

  Forgive my hasty writing. I would have preferred to give you this in person, as Grandfather said it was important, but I could not know if we would have an opportunity to see each other. But now you have it.

  Until we meet again. I hope that may be soon.

  Your friend in Life,

  Arianna

  “You can leave that,” Kris said in a low, thick voice as she replaced the note and the necklace in the cloth bag.

  “Ma’am?” The marine turned from opening the last duffel of her new kit.

  “You can leave it. That’s all, Corporal.”

  He hesitated another instant, then set the bag down on the deck. “Yes, ma’am. Will there be anything else?”

  “No.” The flat syllable had a cutting edge that she would have regretted, had she been able to. The strange cold silent detonation in the core of her being left no place for that.

  His snappy salute and automatic reply, the scuff of his boots on the deck and the hiss of the entry as it opened and closed, were events she registered but had no real connection with, taking place in another dimension, impossibly remote.

  Lying down on the bunk, the necklace clutched above her heart, she felt the beat there as she would have sensed a stranger’s. Her hand clenched around the cloth bag.

  Oh Mariwen . . .

  Her fingers relaxed slightly.

  Oh fuck . . .

  The chime from her stateroom’s entry panel brought Kris back from some liminal space, not between sleeping and waking, but between layers of consciousness where her overtaxed mind had taken brief refuge. The chrono in the bulkhead told her it was brief, once she could make sense of the numbers. Setting aside the necklace and answering the chime—the amber light on the annunciator showed the caller wasn’t on her access list—Kris was surprised to see a striking platinum-haired woman with arresting violet eyes standing there with an uncertain and rather brittle smile.

  “Commander Kennakris?

  Shaking off the last of her daze, Kris responded with a formal and somewhat tight smile of her own.

  “Yes?”

  “I hope you will forgive my approaching you like this,” the woman said. “I know it’s not quite proper, but I wanted to speak to you privately before this evening. I’m Sonja Geris.”

  Kris had been told Lord Geris’s wife was accompanying him on this trip. Formal introductions would be made this PM, over dinner. She was not looking forward to it. Although she’d mostly reconciled herself to “dining with the enemy”, as she still thought of it, these dinners were often dismal affairs, involving too much talking and drinking, neither of which she enjoyed nor exceled at. Lady Geris seeking her out like this was a breach of protocol, and given the sensitive nature of this trip, Kris figured she must have an exceptional reason for doing it.

  And an exceptionally awkward one, judging from the way she was holding herself.

  “May I come in?” asked Lady Geris.

  Kris startled out of her preoccupied state. “Oh, yeah—yes. Sure.”

  She stepped aside to let Lady Geris past. The entrance cycled closed and Kris, never at ease when called on to be a host, and much less so with the unexplained appearance of the wife of a senior Halith emissary, sought for some way to ease the thickening tension.

  “Ah . . . can I get you something? A drink?” The room’s mess portal could surely produce a drink. That usually worked for everyone else.

  “Thank you, that’s . . . very kind.” Her smile fluttered slightly. “But I don’t want to take up more of your time. I only came to tell you . . .” The death grip she had on her nerves visibly tightened and the words came out in a breathy rush. “Mariwen came to Halevirdon. For you. We met. We have . . .” Perfect teeth scraped her lip for an instant. “A history. I wanted you to know she’s all right. She’s safe and on her way home.” Whatever Sonja Geris saw in Kris’s face—probably the same thing that was making her cheeks tingle and her vision blur—made Sonja’s teeth indent her lower lip again. “I thought they might not have told you,” she added hastily. “That would be . . . like them. So I thought I should. I—I hope I’m not intruding.”

  “No . . .” Kris had to pause to work more moisture back into her mouth before she could get another syllable out. “It’s fine. But . . . if you don’t mind . . . how do you know? That’s she’s okay?”

  “Lady—a good friend of mine has . . . connections with Admiral Caneris. He arranged it. She learned it from him and told me.”

  Kris felt Sonja’s eyes searching hers as if begging to be believed. She let go a silent breath and felt the tightness in her diaphragm ease. “Thanks. I, ah . . . appreciate it.”

  Sonja’s chin dipped, her relief palpable. “I’m glad. But you don’t need to thank me.” As Kris opened her mouth only to find she couldn’t think of a response, Sonja forestalled her. “I should be going. We’ll see each other at dinner. But I’m glad I had this chance to meet you. Thank you.”

  That “thank you” was freighted with a great deal more than simple gratitude—a gratitude Kris had done nothing she knew of to deserve—but might be explained by the emotions Sonja was striving to conceal.

  “Me too.” A hollow-sounding reply. “Thanks again for coming to tell me.”

  With a smile that was almost natural now, Sonja gave Kris another nod. “Think nothing of it. Until this evening, then.”

  Returning the nod, Kris stepped to the entry and opened it for her. Sonja Geris paused in the opening and looked over, catching her eyes once more.

  “If it’s all right to ask, would you mind giving Mariwen my regards when you see her? Tell her I wish her every happiness?”

  “I’ll do that”—a distracted, mechanical-sounding reply, nine-tenths reflex.

  “Thank you.” Her eyes dropped, she stepped through and the entry slid shut behind her.

  * * *

  Sonja Geris had been gone barely a minute when her entry panel sounded and Kris swore under her breath before she saw Huron’s name on the annunciator. Barking “Open!”, the entry cycled and Huron stepped in, looking that particular species of unruffled that Kris had long since come to know c
overed a degree of apprehension.

  Embarrassed, she rubbed her forehead. “Sorry, I didn’t mean . . . I’m in a shit mood.”

  “It’s alright, Kris.” His eyes went to her bunk and came back to hers with a quizzical look. “Is that Mariwen’s necklace?”

  Kris craned her neck around. “Yeah.”

  “Did Lady Geris bring it?”

  “No, ah . . . she was just here, though. How did you . . . I mean, why’d you think she did?”

  “She came to me, looking for you. I came by to give you a heads-up. I would’ve been here sooner, but the Commodore corralled me.”

  “She did?”—a distant-sounding question.

  “Dinner. Wanted some input. Diplomacy’s not the strongest part of her skill set.”

  Kris blinked. “Oh. I meant Sonja—Lady Geris. You know her?”

  Huron’s half-smile made a brief appearance over the crossed wires. “I know of her. I hadn’t met her before, though. Her father’s a heavy in the New California diplomatic corps. Dealt with the Halith legation a lot when Geris headed it up between the wars. That’s how they met.”

  “She’s from New California?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Okay . . .” Kris’s voice trailed off. “She said she and Mariwen had a . . . history.”

  “They do.” Huron’s tone became slightly guarded. “Did Mariwen ever tell you about Kat?”

  “Yeah, um . . .”—exhaling as she recalled the memory. “Her girlfriend in college. She mentioned her name once. Kinda . . . outta the blue. Couldn’t remember hardly anything. It upset her. We never brought it up again.”

  “After all she’s been through, that’s no surprise.” And when Kris said nothing, he went on. “Sonja Geris’ name before she got married was Sonja Yekaterina Chappell Dvergsdal-Heberlein. In those days, she went by Kat.”

  “Oh . . .”—as the pieces of the puzzle slid into place.

  “She came to ask about Mariwen?”

  “Yeah, I mean . . .” The embarrassed look was back. “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell ya—no real privacy. I didn’t wanna say anything that might . . .”

  “You don’t need to apologize,” he prompted as the pause drew out. “What was it?”

  “Mariwen was here.”

  His eyebrows elevated to a surprising degree. “Here as in here? Halith Evandor?”

  “Yeah. After they split us up, Captain Malinen came and . . . Oh, what the fuck now?”—as her entry panel chimed for the third time.

  “Popular, I guess.” Huron smiled.

  “Fuck that,” Kris growled as she stepped over to answer it. The open door revealed her batman, standing there looking like he might have overheard her with a red-bordered envelope in his hand.

  “Message for you, ma’am”—extending it. “It’s code-locked.”

  That was obvious from the red border, and Kris nodded as she took it. Code-locking was only used for the most sensitive communications. No one had any conceivable reason to send her a code-locked message.

  Almost no one . . .

  “Thanks, Corporal”—holding the envelope like it might burn her.

  “Yes, ma’am.” He saluted and beat a retreat. Kris cycled the entry closed, laid the envelope on the compartment’s desk and went hunting for a stylus.

  Huron made an offhand gesture at the entry. “I’ll let you deal with that. You can fill me in later.”

  “It’s okay,” Kris said, painstakingly writing her serial number in the boxes on the front of the envelope; any mistake would destroy the message. “Why don’cha stick around a sec?”

  The envelope matched her handwriting and her epithelial cells to her serial number and raised a flap. Taking out the blank sheet inside, she licked her thumb and pressed it to the embossed hex-block in the upper-right corner. Satisfied with both her thumb print and her DNA, text filled the page.

  As she read it, Huron waited; smile dimmed, silent. When she finished, she looked up at him with blurred eyes and held the sheet out.

  “It’s from Mariwen.”

  He accepted it and she watched as his eye traveled down the lines, mostly impassive but the corner of his mouth indenting now and then as he read everything Mariwen had done, tried to do or thought to do—to Sonja, and to herself, for them. She swallowed hard against a surge of feelings, battering those internal barriers.

  “Oh fuck, Rafe”—swallowing again. “Do you know what that cost her?”

  He folded the sheet and handed it back. “More than I can imagine.”

  His expression, that eclipsed look in his eyes, was full of meaning to her now—had been ever since those few terrible hours on the raft—and she dropped her eyes. Sitting down at the desk, she stared at the message, the sheet faintly shaking until she dropped it.

  “Doin’ all that for . . . I dunno. Puttin’ herself through that? Why’d she . . . ?” She traced the crease in the sheet with a fingertip. “She shoulda stayed home.”

  “I’m sure you’d do it for her, Kris.” A gentle sentiment, gently offered.

  “That’s different. She’s . . . worth it.”

  “She feels the same way about you.”

  “Uh huh.” Her gaze was fixed on the last paragraph Mariwen had written.

  Kris, this has shown me parts of myself I didn’t know were there. Maybe I denied them. Maybe I was blind. All I know is that I’m not the girl you met. I’m not who I believed myself to be. I’m not who you fell in love with. Nothing will ever change the way I feel about you. But I can’t ask you to just go on like we were. If you feel differently now, I understand that. We promised to make no promises. But I promise you this: I’m here for you, if you want me to be. If you want to end it between us, I will go. I have to live with who I am and what I’ve become. But you don’t.

  “Why the fuck did she write this?”—shaking her head as she picked up the stylus again.

  “Because ‘know thyself’ can be too damn close to ‘I scare the shit outta myself’?” Rafe answered. She wasn’t at all surprised he knew precisely which passage she meant.

  Fuck’n got that right.

  Applying the stylus to the reply block she wrote:

  Don't be silly. You’re not getting rid of me that easily. I'll see you at home.

  Leaning back and reading, the lighthearted wording clashed with the turmoil of raw emotions inside, the strange intangible weight of them making her words seem flip, insubstantial, insincere.

  God damn it. She’d never been able to answer a letter for shit. There was nothing for it now.

  Scrawling her signature across the hex-block, she wet her thumb and pressed it there again. The encoding took and the text faded from the page. Licking the envelope’s flap, she resealed the message inside and reached for her xel. The message had to be delivered to the battlecruiser’s signals department for transmission and the corporal would probably appreciate having something to do.

  “I can take that if you want. I’m going there anyway.”

  Kris looked back at Rafe, struggling to keep her expression composed.

  “Sure”—taking the easier path. At least, that’s what she thought it was. “Thanks.”

  He took the envelope. “I’ll see you before dinner.”

  “Yeah.”

  She waited until he’d left and then slid onto her bunk. Her hands curled into fists and she rocked forward over her knees, eyes shut tight against the rising pressure. She could hear it, a thin shrill crystalline note on the very edge of hearing—as the walls inside weakened, began to crack . . .

  One hand groped blindly across the bunk, found Mariwen’s necklace, and at the touch, the walls gave way, shattered, the shards exploding through her, releasing all her hoarded tears in a rush, the surge catching her up and making the compartment spin with a roar that drowned her choking sobs.

  The storm passed, too violent, too convulsive, to sustain itself for long; leaving her on her side, limp, worn out, holding the necklace in slack fingers. The thought that she’d hav
e to get up and dress for dinner—no way was she letting the fucking corporal see her like this—warred with the impossible weight of her eyelids.

  Lying there, she fought hard. But her eyelids won anyway.

  Chapter 43

  LSS Artemisia, departing

  Halith Evandor, Orion Spur

  “Why can’t we just do this over dinner, like always?”

  They were approaching the main ladder junction on the way to Commodore Shariati’s stateroom. An ‘informal’ reception had been arranged as an ‘icebreaker’ (a term Kris always found somewhat bizarre since she’d first heard it on Terra years ago), but she did allow that on this occasion there would be ice of glacial proportions, and she didn’t see how the usual methods—quantities of alcohol and small talk, sometimes eked out by a few slightly off-color anecdotes—could deal with it. Dinner at least gave her something to do besides standing around feeling out of her depth, which felt like a big issue right now. She’d managed a quick shower (fully appreciating having her own stateroom, in this case) and to get dressed in time, but the PM had left her emotionally drained. If she no longer felt that hideous detachment, her spirits were not yet recovered and the prospect of having to endure this evening was not helping.

  “It has been decided this occasion warrants setting aside the Navy’s hallowed traditions.”

  “Y’wanna give me a better reason?”

  “I’d be happy to. Give me a couple of days to think of one,” he said, teasing her back. “But that aside, there’s going to be a guest attending that I think need to tell you about.”

  She stopped dead. In the interests of diplomacy, the commodore was hosting this gathering and none of the ship’s officers were attending, just members of the Halith delegation, a few League officials who were here for preliminary talks, and some guests (Kris wasn’t quite sure which category she fit in). She hadn’t paid any attention to exactly who made up the Halith delegation, but she also didn’t have any reason to expect it to include someone she’d need to be warned about, since that’s clearly what Rafe was doing.

  “What’dya mean?”—looking sideways at him.